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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Cognit.

Sec. Perception

This article is part of the Research TopicExploring therapeutic effects of low-frequency sound on psychological and physiological healthView all articles

Cognitive rehabilitation among long-COVID patients using Vibratory and Auditory treatment (VAT) is linked to BDNF

Provisionally accepted
Abdullah MosabbirAbdullah Mosabbir1,2*Jed A MeltzerJed A Meltzer1,2Arkady UryashArkady Uryash3Erika L. BeroncalErika L. Beroncal2Ana Cristina AndreazzaAna Cristina Andreazza2,4Lee R. BartelLee R. Bartel2
  • 1Baycrest Hospital, Toronto, Canada
  • 2University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada
  • 3Mount Sinai Medical Center Department of Pathology, Miami Beach, United States
  • 4Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, Canada

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Cognitive dysfunction occurs in around 40% of long-COVID (LC) patients, and in many cases appears second only to fatigue in prevalence. Vibratory and Auditory treatment (hereafter VAT) within the gamma range has demonstrated improvements in symptoms associated with cognition and fatigue. In this open label pilot study, we tested the effects of VAT on measures of cognition and fatigue in LC. Twenty patients were randomized into a treatment and control group. Symptoms were monitored remotely through mobile apps and in-person visits before and after the treatment period. The treatment group received a device generating 40 Hz of VAT to take home and use every day from Monday to Friday for 4 weeks (i.e. 20 sessions over 28 days), whereas the control group did not use any device but followed the same data collection procedures. This study found that after 4 weeks of VAT participants with LC exhibited increased performance in selective attention and response inhibition, an increased amount of circulating BDNF, and a reduced resting heart rate. We propose that VAT may be a useful rehabilitative tool for LC as well as other targeted populations that seek improvements in cognition or general health but are compromised immunologically or physically.

Keywords: COVID, Long Covid, Vibroacoustic, Sound, Cognition

Received: 25 Aug 2025; Accepted: 24 Oct 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Mosabbir, Meltzer, Uryash, Beroncal, Andreazza and Bartel. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Abdullah Mosabbir, amosabbir@research.baycrest.org

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Supplementary Material